Sonic Adventure 3 Probably Won't Happen Anytime Soon

When we ranked all the Sonic games recently, Sonic Adventure 2 was a pretty contentious game with the staff divided where exactly to put it. Ultimately we placed it near the top on account of the soft spot a couple of us had for the 3D Sonic game. Unfortunately for presumably a lot of millennials whose first Sonic games were part of the Adventure series, a Sonic Adventure 3 might not be in the cards. At least that's according to a new interview with Polygon.

"I hear people saying that they want Adventure 3, but the path that we're on and... Adventure 3, what fans want that to be, might not be an advancement of the series," said Sonic Team head Takashi Iizuka. "So I don't want to do an Adventure 3 and step the franchise back just to give the fans what they want."

That's a pretty fair assessment, especially since there's a more than strong chance that nostalgia is a large part of why gamers look back on the Adventure games with fondness. At the same time, the Sonic Team did find success recently going back in time and delivering an updated take on the past with Sonic Mania, though perhaps that's an oversimplification of what made Mania so good.

Still, Iizuka says that while he and the rest of Sonic Team know that there's a demand for more Adventure games, there's not a lot of interest from the team. "If we can get the gameplay to evolve and get to a place where Adventure 3 makes sense, then you might see an Adventure 3 come out... But we don't want to take the entire series back to where it was just [to] make people happy."

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I don't understand what would differentiate a potential Sonic Adventure 3 from most of the 3D Sonic games that have been released since SA2. Like, what defines the Sonic Adventure series? From what I can tell, it's all about 3D Sonic gameplay with multiple characters where each character has their own gameplay style. Haven't they done that already with later 3D Sonic games?

Back in 2000 I would have said that the Adventure series is all about having Adventure fields to connect the levels (which I loved even though they were pretty awful) but clearly their removal in SA2 showed they weren't integral to the series.

I don't necessarily want a return to the Adventure formula (even though SA2 is, in many respects, a very good game). I just want Sonic Team to figure out WHAT they want to do with Sonic in 3D.@Outrider Sonic Adventure and SA2 play very differently from the games released since--
particularly the "Boost" style of Sonic games, based on the formula laid down in Sonic Unleashed.

I've been saying this for ten years, and it seems to be a fairly controversial opinion, but:

If you ever wanted a "Sonic Adventure 3," then Sonic '06 is basically it.

Yeah, '06 was absolute shit, but it checked practically every box on the "Sonic Adventure checklist." Hub worlds? Check. Collectible emblems? Check. Multiple characters and playstyles with separate but overlapping storylines? Check. I could go on. '06 stuck frighteningly close to the spirit of the Adventure games; for example, both '06 and SA1 were intended to breathe new life into the franchise, took place in more realistic settings... and were glitchy, poorly-programmed messes with cringe-worthy dialogue and cutscenes -- we were just much more willing to ignore those problems in 1999.

About the only thing missing from '06 was the Chao Gardens... which many people would say is enough to debunk my statement, and while I don't entirely agree, that opinion is more than fair.

@DrCorndog Ironically, Sonic Unleashed originally went into development as "Sonic Adventure 3." I imagine they decided to change that title when the boost gameplay proved to be too different from the established formula.

A Sonic Adventure remake with the Sonic Mania treatment (remove glitches, add good voice acting and animation, clean up the story, iron out the mechanical and gameplay issues that you never had the time to correct, make it be in Sonic World rather than 'poorly-rendered hueman world', make Big's levels optional or at least intuitive) would be FANTASTIC. Its music barely needs remixing but they could do that anyway if they wanted.

SA2 struck me as the type of game that streamlined and simplified the SA1 formula without really adding much life into it (once you ESCAPE FROM THE CITY the thrill just tends to peter out, SA1 had a much better 'thrill curve', level variety, story relevance, and willingness to experiment in all directions.)

All of the best 3D Sonic ideas were in SA1, just poorly implemented due to technological limitations and release deadines. Polish THAT one to a shine and you'll set the way forward for motivated (NOT IMITATIVE) designers for a decade or more.

The catch: it's still too big a job for the average fan team, need one with the finances of a Sonic Team but led by those with proper pride in work.